Cameras for motor vehicles generally have an imager module, which is accommodated in a camera housing. The imager module is made up essentially of the image sensor, a carrier device and the lens. The image sensor (imager semiconductor element, imager) may be accommodated in a sensor carrier or mounted directly on a rigid carrier device, in particular a metal plate for good thermal conduction and thus cooling of the image sensor. Such direct mounting of the image sensor on a carrier plate is also known as COB (chip on board).
However, the alignment of the image sensor and the lens is more complex in some cases. The degrees of freedom of the image sensor and of the lens, which is configured as a lens package, i.e., six degrees of freedom, are to be defined for the alignment in general. In an alignment method known as active alignment, the six degrees of freedom are adjusted, and the quality of the alignment in the particular positions is ascertained by detecting a test pattern, for example, and evaluating the image signals of the image sensor by using a modulation transfer function (MTF). The system thereby achieved is subsequently fixed by adhesive bonding, for example.
The optical alignment is thus complex in part. During fixing, care subsequently has to be taken that the achieved alignment is not altered.